Political Economy
In pursuit of the common good; the American Founders and unanimity
By Lawrence A. Hunter, Ph..D.
An unhealthy tendency arose during the 20th Century to equate representative democracy, what America’s Founding Fathers called a Republic, with majority rule — to equate the “will of a majority” with the “public interest,” the “public good,” the “will of the people,” the “common good” or the “national interest.” The Founding Fathers certainly did not subscribe to any such equation. Indeed, one of James Madison's major intellectual contributions to political economy and practical constitutional design was his effort to distinguish between the “will of a majority” and the “will of the people.”
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New Federalism, Old Illusions
Lawrence A. Hunter, Ph.D
June 26, 2009
An editorial in the Washington Examiner Friday ran under the headline “Conservatives must rediscover federalism.” When I read it, I had a feeling of déjà vu harkening back to the Reagan days of “New Federalism” when I was research director of the Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations (ACIR).
I had come to ACIR from the Senate Intergovernmental Relations Subcommittee on Capitol Hill at the behest of the Commission’s chairman Bob Hawkins. Hawkins at that time also was chairman of the Institute for Contemporary Studies, an early think tank founded in 1974 by Ed Meese and other Reagan associates intent on building an intellectual foundation beneath what later was characterized as “The Reagan Revolution.”
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An Intellectual Crisis In American Federalism
By Dr. Lawrence Hunter and Ronald J. Oakerson
May 27, 2009
Generations of students have been taught that the Supreme Court of the United States is the great umpire of the American political system, an impartial referee policing the boundaries of authority between institutions of government and between government and the individual. The role of the Court, as commonly understood, is to protect against an improper and unconstitutional exercise of power by any institution of government vis-a-vis any other institution or individual, including the actions of both federal and state governments in relation to one another. Yet from 1936 to 1976, the Court did not overturn a single act of Congress for encroaching unduly upon
the powers of the states. Read More...
Totalitarianism In Democracy; Tyranny By Committee
Lawrence A. Hunter Ph.D.
July 23, 2008
Princeton University professor emeritus Sheldon Wolin, viewed by many scholars as one of the deans of American political theorists and widely recognized as a liberal, argues in his recently published book Democracy Incorporatedthat the United States has evolved into a new political hybrid in which economic and state powers are conjoined and virtually unbridled, producing what he calls “inverted totalitarianism.” Wolin states the thesis of his book this way:
"It is possible for a form of totalitarianism, different from the classical one, to evolve from a putatively 'strong democracy' instead of a 'failed one.'"
Wolin, Sheldon S., Democracy Incorporated: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2008... Read More...
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Recent News
Tuesday, May 21, 2013
If you’re an unmarried senior with no dependents, make $15,000 a year, and spend $10,000 of it on medical care, under the official poverty measure you’d most likely not count as poor, as $15,000 is above the 2012 poverty threshold for a single senior ($11,011).
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Sunday, May 12, 2013
An analysis of four years of Medicare prescription records shows that some doctors and other health professionals across the country prescribe large quantities of drugs that are potentially harmful, disorienting or addictive. Federal officials have done little to detect or deter these hazardous prescribing patterns.
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Wednesday, May 8, 2013
Two House Republicans have told constituents they oppose proposed cuts to Social Security and veterans benefits by reducing the cost of living adjustment. President Barack Obama included the plan, known as chained CPI, in his annual budget.
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Friday, April 26, 2013
Treatments and their risks and benefits play out differently in the elderly population. Diabetes is rarely the only ailment affecting people in their 70s and 80s; most must cope with several chronic conditions, along with their associated medications. That makes keeping blood sugar at reasonable levels a complicated business involving lots of tradeoffs.
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Thursday, April 11, 2013
If you have a parent, grandparent, or child just getting into computers for the first time, do the world a favor and teach them these basic misconceptions before you end up getting the call to come over and clean the horse manure out of their processor.
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Sunday, April 21, 2013
The US has announced that it will provide militants in Syria, now openly admitted to being Al Qaeda terrorists, with $123 million in military aid - while cancer care for seniors at home is being rationed.
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Friday, April 12, 2013
(VIDEO) Obama vowed he would never cut Social Security. Now he is proposing a change in the cost-of-living measure (the so-called "Chained CPI") to do just that, all the while he denies it will cut benefits for current retirees.
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Source:
With Obama pushing for cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, the best chance of stopping those spending reductions could be the GOP’s blanket opposition to higher taxes. Although GOP leaders insist that entitlement cuts should be a big part of any sweeping deficit deal, they also have been unwilling to concede to Obama’s demand for higher taxes to get them, which could be a deal killer.
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Friday, April 5, 2013
President Obama will propose cuts next week to Social Security and other entitlements as part of a renewed effort to strike a long-term deficit-reduction deal with Republicans, the White House said Friday. Obama will embrace a plan — known as chained CPI — that would reduce cost-of-living increases for Social Security recipients through a more restrictive measure of inflation, according to officials first cited by Reuters and The New York Times.
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Wednesday, April 3, 2013
At a recent Denver Post editorial board public forum on gun legislation, U.S. Rep Diana DeGette was asked by a male senor citizen how he could defend himself under the new Colorado gun laws. DeGette said, “The good news for you, you live in Denver. The Denver PD would be there within minutes. (laughing) You’d probably be dead anyway.”
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